Houston B. Teehee

Houston Benge Teehee (sometimes spelled Tehee) (October 14[1][2] or 31,[3][4] 1874 – November 19, 1953[5]) was an American lawyer and politician who served as Register of the Treasury from 1915 to 1919.

Houston B. Teehee, circa 1921

Early life

Teehee[lower-alpha 1] was born in the town of Muldrow, in the Cherokee Nation[4] (modern-day Oklahoma). He was five-eighths Cherokee.[6][lower-alpha 2] His father, Rev. Stephen Teehee (or "Tehee") (1837–1907)[3] was a Baptist minister and a unilingual speaker of Cherokee,[1] who was originally from Cherokee territory in Georgia,[3]; at various times, he served the Cherokee Nation as a district clerk, a district solicitor, and a circuit judge, and was part of its Executive Council and its senate[3].

His mother was Rhoda Benge, who died in 1886, when she was thirty-nine;[3] at the time, Teehee was twelve.[2]

Teehee attended the Cherokee Male Seminary[9] in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, and afterward spent one year at Fort Worth University.[2]

He then returned to Tahlequah, where he spent ten years working in retail,[1] and two in a bank.[3] During this time, he studied law with John H. Pitchford.[1]

Political career

In 1902, Teehee was elected alderman of Tahlequah, a position he retained until 1906.[3] In March 1907, he was admitted to the bar,[3] and in June 1908[3] he resigned from the bank and opened his own law practice.[1] Later that year, he was elected Mayor of Tahlehquah, a position he held until 1910.[10]

In 1910, he was elected to the Oklahoma House of Representatives, where he represented Cherokee County; he was subsequently re-elected to this position in 1912.[1]

On March 3, 1915, Woodrow Wilson nominated Teehee to be Register of the United States Treasury, replacing Gabe E. Parker;[11] Teehee was sworn in on March 24, 1915.[12]

As Register, Teehee personally signed so many Liberty Bonds that he experienced repetitive strain injury, permanently damaging his hand and arm.[4] In October 1919, Teehee announced his resignation as Register, to become effective as of the 31st of that month.[13]

Notes
  1. The surname is said to have originated when his grandfather, whose name was transliterated by later sources as "Dehininee"[6] and "Di-hi-hi",[7] (meaning "killer"), enlisted in the Union Army[8] during the American Civil War; "the nearest the recruiting sergeant could come to it was 'Teehee', and so it went into the record and became affixed as a family name."[6]
  2. According to Emmet Starr's 1922 History of the Cherokee Indians and Their Legends and Folk Lore, "On the rolls of the Cherokee Nation his father is listed as seven-eighths Cherokee. Houston B. Teehee as five-eighths. His mother was a one-half Cherokee, her death occurring prior to the enrollment."[3]

References
  1. Houston Benge Teehee, at the Oklahoma State Senate; retrieved April 3, 2023
  2. "Houston B. Tehee", by Beulah Bluebird, in The Oklahoma Indian School Magazine; vol. II, no. 1, January 1933; p. 16
  3. Tehee, Houston Benge, in History of the Cherokee Indians and Their Legends and Folk Lore; by Emmet Starr; published 1922 by Warden Company; via archive.org
  4. TEEHEE, HOUSTON BENGE (1874–1953), by Dianna Everett; at the Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture; retrieved April 3, 2023
  5. Houston Benge Tehee, in The Chronicles of Oklahoma, vol. XXXVII, p. 384; published 1959
  6. Houston B. Teehee, from the Arizona Range News; excerpted in The Native American, magazine of the Phoenix Indian School, vol. 16, no. 22, published May 29, 1915; compiled in The Native American volume 16, p. 256
  7. The Papers of John Peabody Harrington in the Smithsonian Institution 1907-1957, volume six, edited by Elaine L. Mills and Ann J Brickfield; p. 48
  8. This Indian's Name is on Your Liberty Bond in The Tomahawk; published December 26, 1918; p. 1; via Chronicling America
  9. Out of the "Graves of the Polluted Debauches": The Boys of the Cherokee Male Seminary, by Devon Mihesuah; in American Indian Quarterly; Autumn, 1991, Vol. 15, No. 4; p. 515
  10. Teehee, Houston Benge, at the Oklahoma Hall of Fame; retrieved April 4, 2023
  11. Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate, Volume 63, Issue 3; published 1934; p. 259
  12. This Indian's Name Is On Your Liberty Bond, in The Tomahawk; p. 8; published December 26, 1918; via Chronicling America
  13. H. B. TEEHEE, REGISTER OF TREASURY, RESIGNS, in the Washington Evening Star; published October 29, 1919; p. 16; via Chronicling America
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